Multiple Worlds Theory
by FlurryOfDestiny
Summary: the multiple worlds theory is that for every action there is a parallel universe where a different action is taken and therefor a different future is created... does destiny exist? If a different action is taken, is it necessarily better? cheesy i know
1. Chapter 1

AN: spoilers!! (havoc got hurt in the manga and can't walk) that's it. Oh! And here's a surprise: I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist or anything else!

Chapter 1

Ed awoke to a cackling maniacal laughter. Opening his eyes he found himself floating in nothing, although he felt like he was standing on ground. Had he gone blind? With a startled yelp he brought a hand close to his face. No, his hand was visible. Scanning the area he found Al just behind him, Mustang sprawled on his face a few feet to the left, and Hawkeye and Havoc even farther to the right. They shifted and twitched as if asleep. But Al doesn't sleep. Panic welled up and, stupidly, he shook his brother's metal body. It clinked and grated against the non-existent ground, waking the others. They said nothing as Ed tried to get his brother's attention, ignoring their concerned stares.

Ed gave the armor a good solid shove and it slid across the emptiness making a sound not unlike a chalkboard. Al leaped to his feet in an instant. He turned to Ed and he could only assume he was demanding what he was doing. But Al had no lips to read and Ed's ears were ringing from the echo.

"Al, wait," Ed held his ears "And I thought you were dead!" Al said something else but he could only hear mumbling, Al didn't seem happy.

After everything was explained and the obvious was discussed (they didn't know where they were, how they got there or why) Havoc finally asked the important question: now what?

"Oh, yeah, and I guess I can walk here." He added as an afterthought. Mustang glanced at him almost hopefully.

"And I can sleep, I guess." Al interrupted

"Yeah, and pretty damn soundly to." Ed continued, rubbing his ear. Mustang rose from the circle they were seated in.

"Well," he dusted nonexistent dirt off his pants "If Havoc can walk we'll-"

"Walk?" Hawkeye asked. Mustang slumped; obviously upset that someone called him on that idea.

Ed stared down past his crossed legs. What if they really were trapped? He slumped also. The darkness closed in on him. The shear emptiness pulled and tore at him. If they were trapped would they die of dehydration? They were obviously not bound by physical limitations: Havoc could walk, Al could sleep... they might just go on living in boredom forever without getting hungry or... or what if they just couldn't die? To suffer eternal hunger and thirst. A fate worse then –

"AH!" Ed's dark thoughts were interrupted by a sharp pain in his eye. Rubbing it he removed a lock of hair. It must have blown in while he was staring at the ground. That's what he got for – blown?

"A draft," he mumbled aloud "from where?"

"A draft?" Mustang asked, closing his eyes "oh, right, from that way, I think." He motioned to his left.

"Well let's get out of this hole then," Havoc suggested, lifting himself up. Mustang and Hawkeye glanced at him but said nothing.

Soon they were walking at a steady pace towards the source of the wind. Although they walked calmly the force of the wind gave the impression that they were running. Ed's left foot dragged on the ground strangely sometimes. It had never done that before. He asked everyone to stop, yet when they did the wind became nothing more than a draft again. Ed sat and examined his boot to be sure he wasn't wearing it out. When he stood again his left hand pushed off the ground. Just as from when he sat before the ground was smooth to the touch, like glass or ice, but when his boot scraped against it when they walked it grated like asphalt. They started off again, still Ed's boot dragged. The wind became strong as well.

"Pick up your feet, Ed." Hawkeye lectured

"I can't help it!" Ed sulked "It's like I've forgotten how to walk properly." Mustang considered this as they walked. He turned to Havoc suddenly.

"Can I have your cigarette?" he asked with his hand out

"If you're going to start smoking do it with your own, I don't have many left." Havoc told him around the one in his mouth.

"Then just give me the butt of that one!" Mustang negotiated "it doesn't really matter."

"Sure, just wait a bit."

"No, I need it now." There was a small explosion and the cigarette was blown in two as Havoc spit it to the ground.

"You could have just waited instead of trying to kill me!" Havoc panted while Mustang picked up the pieces.

"You have stuff on your face..." Al said trying to help. Mustang rolled the pieces into a tight ball and threw it as far behind them as he could, which wasn't far because of its small mass. It lay five feet from where he stood and they walked forward like Mustang wasn't insane, but after three steps he stopped them, turned and pointed.

Ed was still fuming about the wind that rushed by in these three steps as he turned. There, thirty feet behind them, was the ball, still smoking faintly.

"How-?" Ed demanded "How is that possible?"

"That's why you can't walk right," Mustang commented "but it only works when we walk at the same time."

"Then let's run and get the hell out of this place!" Ed suggested loudly "I'm tired of this place and my boot won't last long."

"You aren't hungry?" Hawkeye asked.

Ed shook his head no "we have to get out of this weird place!" she began to walk quickly ahead leaving the blond glaring.

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AN: more chapters to come... I'm just really lazy. they'll probably be really long...


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

After twenty minutes of continuous jogging (which was much easier on Ed's boot.) they stood before a window. 15' by 15' it stood with no frame, a glare from some mysterious light source prevented it from being transparent. Havoc walk around the back while Ed and Mustang examined it more carefully. Ed tapped on it with his right arm and it made a small sound not unlike that of a large church bell.

"Well that's not the sound glass usually makes," Mustang commented "and glass usually doesn't let wind pass through." He motioned to Ed's hair which swayed gently in the breeze. Ed shifted his coat to cover his braid, while giving his colonel another sour look.

"H-hey!" Havoc's voice sounded from somewhere distant "I can't find anything here!" he was sounding stressed and distant.

Hawkeye followed his footsteps but stopped short and retreated from just behind the window. The glare prevented the alchemists from seeing either of them through it.

"There you are!" Havoc exclaimed. Footsteps echoed and within a few minutes Havoc was panting against the near side of the window.

"It's totally empty back there," he tried to explain "the windows here on this side but on the other side it's empty. It's just not there. There's a whole new span of nothing where it should be. I got lost in it, and then I had to run back at normal speed to where I saw where Hawkeye was."

"He did walk at normal speed coming back." Hawkeye said "maybe it only works if we're walking towards the wall"

"Window," Havoc corrected "the thing on the other side's just too bright to see and walls aren't made of glass."

"Neither is this," Al said "glass doesn't sound like that."

"And none of us can transmute it" Ed finished.

"Well I'm pretty sure," Havoc continued "that I 'skipped' over there. I only took a few steps and had to run back. I couldn't tell I was doing it though, there's no wind on that side."

"What the hell's up with this 'window' anyway?" Ed demanded "I just wanna get out of here!" he punched the wall, full force, with his right arm. A loud, deep sound echoed from the impact. It shook them as it vibrated out. Oddly, the sound didn't dissipate; it just went on and on. They covered their ears to defend themselves from the continuous ringing. Slowly, from behind the deep sound, came a high pitched noise, almost like that of an electronic ring (mosquito/ teen buzz) and began over taking the deep sound.

Mustang yelled to Ed but was drowned out. In an instant all noise ceased except a faint cracking sound that had been underneath the others. Whatever was on the other side of the window cracked and chipped, but when they examined it a face on the other side examining the crack as well.

Edward Elric stood staring at a crack not ten feet from the Ed that was trapped with the rest of them in this black abyss. But he couldn't see them.

"What happened?" Al's voiced gently from behind him.

"I'm not sure," the window glazed and frosted quickly and, instead, showed the room as if the window wall in the house the other Elric boys occupied.

"Walls don't just brake for no reason," Al continued.

"Yeah, I know," his brother admitted "but it wasn't me!" Mustang turned to the real Elric boys. They stood in shock.

"They're us," Ed began, he stammered but nothing else came.

"They're you," Mustang confirmed.

"Yeah, but, not" Al explained "Ed has his limbs and I have..." the Ed and Al on the other side of the window did have all their bodies back. They looked different to, other than that, but Mustang couldn't tell how.

"Maybe it's your future," Havoc tried to calm the boys down "it could be, right?" Ed shook: no.

"We're the same age," he explained "but our bodies are different. It's like we never tried to..." he left it hanging.

"Maybe we should get some sleep." Hawkeye suggested. The window darkened as if to second her point. Ed was positive he'd never get to sleep. After all he'd been through alot an seing hinself ws kinda wird hw anyn expla...

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AN: words slur when you fall asleep.


	3. Chapter 3

AN: we'll actually get started eventually, but yes the 'real' people will watch from the empty space the whole time.

Chapter 3

Ed woke, not because he wasn't tired, but because the window was staring directly into the sun. Groaning, they woke up in turn slowly, including Al, who was very happy to be sleeping again.

The window shifted to show Ed (the other Ed) asleep despite the light shining into the room. He was taller than the Ed trapped in the empty place, which was to be expected, but only by an inch or two. His hair was shorter and couldn't be kept in a tail, let alone braided. He also was thinner, as if he and Ed didn't share a life style of fighting.

As Ed himself scanned the room he noticed other differences in lifestyle. Even though his counterpart slept deeply surrounded by books (there was even one on his head) only half of them were alchemy books. Others were pure fiction books. Peeking out from behind a small pile of novels by various authors were cords. In fact cords lay in heaps between the stacks, if one looked close enough. It seemed his counterpart found interest in electronics. _Strange_ Ed thought.

"Ed! Get up!" Al's small voice sounded from behind the door. "We'll be late!" Ed slept on. Silence for a moment, then "I wish you wouldn't lock the door." Al thumped the door hard, with his shoulder, most likely, causing Ed to wake finally. He jumped, fell from the bed and knocked over a small pile of books onto himself.

"I-I'm awake, Al." He called, staking the books again "Go without me. I just... can't go today." He pulled a blanket on top of himself, knocking the pile he'd just stacked.

"Ed?" Al sounded concerned "should I stay with you?"

"No, no, I'm fine." He made his bed in an attempt to keep himself awake. "Just tired and a bit nauseous. Go, I'll just clean up the house and take it easy."

"I don't know," Al considered "you've been sick a lot lately." Ed stood, wearing brown pants and nothing more, and walked to the door. Opening it he pulled his brother into his room.

"I really need to clean." He told him, motioning to the floor.

"Okay, fine." Al surrendered. He was dressed and ready to go... somewhere. Al was taller than Ed by about three inches and just as thin. Although, somehow Al seemed healthier. He turned and walked to the kitchen with Ed following groggily. He snatched up a bag, slung it over his shoulder and opened the door.

"Uh, do the dishes," he reminded his brother, who dozed against the fridge, "And you should pick up your books. If you have time, sweep. You shouldn't just sleep all day either." He paused and let his brother continue to make grunts of agreement even though he said nothing. He smiled and pushed Ed's shoulder, causing him to fall. Ed only saved himself by grabbing the top of the fridge at the last second. "And put a shirt on at some point." Ed scoffed as Al left.

"It's nice to see you two getting along so well still" Havoc commented.

"Yeah" Ed mumbled "but I wonder what's wrong with me, uh, him?"

"So far it seems to be depression," Havoc noted. The other Ed drifted back to his room slowly. Or was he just tired? Ed's counterpart grabbed a baggy shirt and settled down in the living room to read.

Al meanwhile was walking down a road outside their house. It looked like a typical neighborhood, except the amount of snow. Being from a warmer climate the Ed and Al in the empty space had never seen that much snow in one place before. The snow banks where it had been piled were taller than Havoc, at least. Some snow fell around him also, thick, wet, heavy snow. It stuck to Al's hair, clothes and face, but he didn't seem to notice. He just blinked them away if they landed to close to his eyes.

"I look thoughtful," Al mumbled in the silence of the emptiness. "Or he does? How do I refer to them/ us and be grammatically correct?"

"Either way we'll understand." Mustang explained "just refer to them as 'them', and he does look thoughtful doesn't he? Al, what would you be concerned about? If we have the real boys here we might as well compare them." Al considered the question.

"Well the only thing I can see is that Ed's not feeling well and that I left him home alone after asking him to clean. I'd feel worried" Mustang smiled. "But I'd probably have to do the work myself anyway." Ed glared while Al giggled.

Al, uh, the other one, the one walking in snow. He was slowly approaching an average sized building with a school emblem on the front; the name was covered in snow and couldn't be read. He walked inside and shook the snow from his coat and hair. Shrugging off his coat he walked quickly down an empty hall.

"I'm late;" he groaned "I should have just stayed home with Ed." He turned a corner and entered a loud class room.

"I never thought about it before," Hawkeye thought aloud "but if they weren't working with us they'd be in school." The Al through the window apologized for being late and was excused for his brother. He took a seat and paid very little attention to what was being said in class.

"Not much is changed," Ed mumbled "I suppose we either don't work at all or do all our work on our own. I wonder how serious we're taking alchemy."

They discovered they didn't feel hunger or thirst in the emptiness, so while the other Al avoided studying Ed, Al, and Mustang continued examining the window. They also examined the other side, and how it was not there no matter what one did. Once, Ed held on to the side a walked behind it. He could feel it but he couldn't see it, or his arm. He walked in a circle while trying to hold on, but after he walked a 180 circle (so that his arm should be wrapped around it) it was gone. Mustang stood on the edge to give him a reference point but Ed was lost. They could hear him but they couldn't tell from where. Ed retraced his steps without turning around and collided with Mustang. After that they stayed on the side with the window having decided that those experiments were too dangerous and also that it was scary as hell over there.

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AN: I've writen way more, but not typed it. I'm to lazy!


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